Canary Fly, Canary Cry
by protractor
Summary: While Sherlock is being held captive during his three year hiatus, he talks to a canary what he would have liked to say to John. injured!sherlock. Rated T for such injuries.


Author's Note: There are mentions of light torture, so if you are sensitive to anything like that, please don't read. Also, this is set during Sherlock's three year hiatus, and everyone thinks he's dead like they're supposed to. Also, I can't remember where I found the title for this fanfiction, only that it was on this website. If I copied someone, I apologize. My story is original.

Leave a review if you like the story. It fuels the gas guzzling writing machine and keeps the grinch happy.

 _Canary fly,_

 _Canary cry_

 _Lest you see me_

 _When I die._

The canary once belonged to someone, but that someone did not want it and so let it loose, unlocking the bars of its cage to release it to a cruel, cold world.

At first, the canary didn't know what to do with itself without its past home, with its food and water and comfort. Yet it adapted, and eventually, it made a new home for itself in an iron place, just like its old cage. A room in an abandoned warehouse.

The canary was startled when a man was thrown into the room, bloodied and broken, lifeless. Dead looking. He was tall, even lying down, and his curly hair had refused to submit in his death.

He made no sound, only lay there, as still and pale as a corpse.

When the body moved, the canary _freaked_ and abandoned the area.

….

The canary finds the courage to return. The man is still hurt and bleeding, but no one seems to care. As they hurt him _more,_ the man's mind (so sharp, intellectual, _observing)_ seems to slip. He starts calling the canary John.

"I'm tired, John," he says. "I want to go back to Baker Street."

The canary tilts its head and chirps, wondering where Baker Street is.

The man, who is lying on the floor, cracks a bruised eye and scoffs. "London will fall before Mrs. Hudson leaves Baker Street. You know that, John."

The thought of this Baker Street seems to comfort him, if only a little. The canary knows that one can hardly be comforted in the conditions.

The warehouse lets the ripping window of whatever cold country the canary found its way to in, and snow falls through crack in the roof. The room is void of any bed to rest on. A kicked-over bucket is the only sign of a bathroom. It's inhumane.

Every day, the mean, angry men with the twisted faces return to torment the man. Eventually, he quits reacting in pain to their kicks, and they don't like this. They question him, yelling in a strange, harsh-sounding language which the man always replies to them in. His words are smug and full of self-confidence he would be better without.

When they leave after constraining him to a cylinder block, the curious canary flitters down from its hidden nest to comfort him.

"Have you moved on, John?" he asks bitterly. "Have you already forgotten me?

 _No,_ the canary answers in its head.

"You don't have a life without me, John." The man finds this amusing for a few seconds. "I want to go home, but I have to wait for Mycroft."

The canary does not know who Mycroft is, yet it still flies out to search for him.

….

A few days later, the man catches a fever. The canary knows this because his forehead is a bright red, and he is sweating, but his shivers and complains of the cold. His health can't be high because of all of the burns and cuts he has received. His rambles also continue.

"I didn't want to leave, John. He was going to kill all of you – Mrs. Husdon, Lestrade, and... you. Are you happy now, John? I've admitted it. You're my friend." He coughs into his shoulder.

His captors aren't too pleased about his being sick, because when he's sick, the deductions ramp up.

"Your daughter isn't living at home, and you're currently displeased at her because of her choice of a college roommate – you don't approve of the way they decorate either, and you're thinking of demanding that she moved home, although why you want to listen to that horrible rock music she likes is beyond me."

"Your collar shows me that you have an apple tree and a wife with a limp."

"Quitting cigarettes hasn't done you any good. The damage has already been done, hasn't it?

They hate him for it and yell questions about "agents" and "documents," which the man claims to no nothing about.

"Have you seen this man?" one of them snarls, holding up a photograph.

The man eyes it for a second. "Yes..." He trails off.

"Where? What's his name?" the other man shouts.

"He looks rather like your mother... a florist, I believe..." He chokes when the man punches him and smiles. "Was that accurate?" The smiles dies when the knife cuts into his skin and leaves a trail of red, crystal-like blood. He has so many of those marks on him. His wrists are marred from the period in which he tried to escape. Being so weak, he could only cut his wrists against the zip ties, not remove them.

The canary does not see how he has held up the lie so long – surely, he's going to give up one of these days, because no one can survive for that long.

If the man isn't going to give up, the canary decides it is not going to give up, either. It has gathered the courage to hop around his head, chirping.

"I know how to make tea," the man confesses. "I just like the way you and Mrs. Hudson make it. I'd do anything for one cup of tea."

The canary has not had tea and wonders if it tastes anything like the tears on his cheeks, whose owner is unaware of them.

Mycroft doesn't appear to be coming, which the canary accepts sooner than he does. He isn't. It expects the man to be hurt when he realizes it, but he is not. Maybe he knows Mycroft better than it does, or simply does not care.

He doesn't care about a lot of things, like the snow from the howling storms that shake the remains of the warehouse.

"Is it cold there in London, John?" the man asks. "Mrs. Hudson will want the heat fixed if she hasn't already. Lestrade will have more unsolved cases, and Anderson's IQ will drop _at least_ another ten points after he drinks some of that alcoholic eggnog he insists on every year.

"Molly... and Sally – oh, I'm getting _sentimental!"_ He spits out the last word, like its a curse to be hated. "If only... Mycroft could see me now..." He's exhausted, no wonder.

….

They have not been very kind again. Bravely, the canary sits in the palm of his hand when they leave and chirps, hoping to revive some life into him that they and the winter have stolen.

"You remind me of my violin."

The canary is surprised he is no longer John.

"My Stradivarius," he clarifies, closing his eyes. His face looks like death warmed over, which scares the canary, so it pecks his hand lightly. His blue eyes fly open.

"What?"

The canary is not surprised that he plays the violin. Like his body, his fingers are long and thin, perfect for maneuvering about the strings, but they are bruised and weak.

"I didn't know you could sing, John," he says. "You always liked to keep your talents hidden from everyone." He laughs weakly, but in a baritone rumble. "You always put up with me, John. That was one of your hidden talents. Why?"

The man is silent for a long while, staring up at the patched roof, until he suddenly speaks. "Sing me a song, John."

The canary willingly obliges.

….

Even though Sherlock has been sick for many days, with hardly any food and water and many monstrous beatings, Mycroft does not come. The canary at least _tries_ to bring him food for his malnourished form, but it is only so big and tires easily. It cannot feed a grown man but crumbs.

"Mycroft is taking his sweet time to get here," he grumbles. "He's probably enjoying cigars and getting fat on whatever meal his cook has scraped together. He needs to diet."

….

The man's captors have not come around for several days. Although this gives the man a reprieve from them, he turns delirious.

"Oysters are taking over the world. They may be excellent sea food now, but in a few years – maybe months! – they will have covered every known surface to man. John, do put some half crowns in your left pocket. It would even you out so much better."

"Don't touch those eyeballs, Mrs. Hudson! I need them for my experiment!"

When his ramblings die out, he closes his eyes and falls asleep. He tosses in turns on the cold, uncomfortable floor. A night passes slowly as the moon inches its way across the sky to be replaced by the sun.

Suddenly, his eyes snap open. "I've discovered it, John. It took me longer than normally, but I found it.

"You care, John. You're my friend. I didn't realize it until now, but it's too late, isn't it? I'm already dead to you and everyone but Molly.

"You care too much, John. It's too late, but... I'm glad you were my friend."

With this final confession, he closes his eyes again.

….

The canary thinks he is gone, but when it investigates, it finds that his heart is still beating slowly, circulating whatever blood is left in his system. His breathing is shallow.

Shouts come up from somewhere outside the building. The canary thinks that they have returned and are fighting over liquor and a poker game, like they were wont to do after torturing the man for information he will never give up.

If they are there to finish him off, the canary vows that it will stay with him to the end. He has been so brave.

But it is not drunk, unruly, monstrous men who open the door to the room. It is a man in a posh, finely tailored suit, swinging an umbrella in one hand. As anger flirts across his face, the canary realizes that _this_ is Mycroft, although there is nothing to tell him that.

The man on the floor cracks open an eye. "Mycroft. You're late, dear brother of mine."

Mycroft breathes out, the only sign that he might be upset at the state of his sibling. "Sherlock. Traffic was horrible. You understand, of course?"

Sherlock snorts. "Get me out of here, Mycroft." Mycroft obeys and cuts those nasty zip ties that are covered with his blood and throws them to the side.

Sherlock can't stand, so one of Mycroft's agents carries him, which he obviously isn't pleased with. The canary watches them go. Sherlock is finally free, and wherever he is going, the canary hopes he finds the real John and tells him the missing words.

….

The canary eventually found its way out of the cold country that it had been stuck in so long. It flew many exhausting miles until it came to a country with large, stone buildings and foggy weather. As it swooped over the streets to a colorful looking park with many trees, it thought it saw a tall man with curly hair, sitting on a park bench with another shorter man. His face isn't as pale, but his eyes are the same startling blue.

But he couldn't be the canary's Sherlock, could he?

 _Canary fly,_

 _Canary cry,_

 _This will not be_

 _My final goodbye._


End file.
